Mark Bellison (Ricky Gervais), a screenwriter who’s just been fired from his job at a documentary film studio, is being kicked out of his apartment. While standing in line at the bank, where’s he gone to withdraw money to rent a moving truck, he suddenly finds himself able to perform a feat heretofore unknown in human history: he can lie. When it becomes apparent that those around him will believe anything he says--no matter how outrageous or outlandish--Mark sets out to get back his job, make himself fabulously wealthy, and win the heart of Anna McDoogles (Jennifer Garner), a woman everyone says is out of his league.

CRITIQUE

The few times I’ve seen Ricky Gervais in a feature film--Stardust, Night at the Museum--I’ve often thought he was better than the material. The same is true here, but in this case Gervais gave birth to the material.

The Invention of Lying marks his theatrical writing-directing debut, and on both jobs he shares credit with another neophyte, Matthew Robinson; even if you’re not aware going in that what you’re about to watch is the work of couple of first-timers, it will be evident from pretty much the first frame. The visuals have a flat, lifeless, point-and-shoot quality, and the pacing is pokey.

That’s not much of a surprise, given the filmmakers’ untested talents behind the camera, but the script’s problems are. Gervais has spent the better part of the current decade proving himself to be one of the sharpest, most consistent comedy writers around. This movie breaks that streak.

The Invention of Lying really deserves three reviews, as each act plays like a completely separate movie. The first act is an amusing satirical fantasy; the second is a misguided religious satire; the third is a contrived, artificial, clichéd romantic comedy. Care to guess which of the three I actually enjoyed? Now care to guess which two I squirmed and suffered through simply so I could truthfully say I squirmed and suffered through them?

The movie begins as a one-joke story (although the rules of that one joke are a bit odd, but more on that in a second), then turns into a two-joke story; while repetitive, the jokes are pretty funny. But it then becomes a no joke-story, which is a pretty stupid (not to mention deadly) thing for a comedy to do, especially when it still has the better part of an hour to kill. The movie becomes unfunny the minute it becomes a religious satire, and with no laughs to cover up its storytelling deficiencies, its misguided, muddled aims become that much clearer.

The movie posits the idea that religion (particularly Christianity) is nothing more than a lie to make people feel better about dying; this may or may not be part of the truth, but it’s extremely doubtful that any religion or myth has its origins in such a practice. You look at any society’s myths or folktales and you’ll see what began as an effort to explain the unexplainable--the refinements come later. Lying uses an origin plot to attack the refinements, which doesn’t work. And its attacks consist of heavy-handed silliness and cheap shots; its outright dismissal of any religion’s set of beliefs as being the province of the feebleminded is a cop-out.

As bad as the midsection is, the final act is far worse. Rather than mocking those dime-a-dozen romantic comedies about the likeable schlub who tries to win the girl of his dreams away from the slick, slimy creep she’s about to marry, The Invention of Lying actually becomes one of those movies. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, the man who gave the world the gems that are The Office and Extras actually co-authored himself a part in which his character heads to a church in order to stop the love of his life from making a mistake she’ll soon come to regret. That’s something in a million years I never expected to see; trust me when I say that actually seeing it is even far more painful than you’d expect it to be.

Now about that wonky first act--okay, so it’s established that no one in this alternate reality or fantasy land or whatever the hell it is has developed the capacity to lie (they don’t even have a word for it). Now before Mark develops this capacity (which is presented as being an evolutionary advancement, which raises several questions, but whatever), he and the other characters exhibit a rather inconsistent compulsion to say whatever is on their minds (which isn’t the same as telling the truth), or reveal exactly what they’ve been up to (ditto).

For example, when Mark and Anna first meet, she reveals that she has been pleasuring herself. Is that the truth or is that an unnecessarily full disclosure? I suppose that’s a judgment call, but I bring it up because the movie keeps violating its own internal logic. When Mark’s boss is getting ready to fire him, he stands in front of Mark and hems haws, although according to the setup he should just come right out and left Mark have it.

Businesses are named by exactly what service they provide--a coffee shop is Coffee Shop, for instance (this falls in line with the movie’s assertion that having any sort of imagination is tantamount to lying, which doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, but whatever). But that doesn’t prevent Coke, Pepsi, and Budweiser from being marketed under brand names; this is due to that fact that said brands paid for product placement, of course, and considering how often their products become the focus of any scene, they obviously got their money’s worth (never mind that this makes some of the movie’s satirical jabs seem disingenuous).

But like I said, at least this section of the movie, while still just as messy as the two that follow, is funny. It’s by no means funny enough to rescue the movie or make it worth seeing, though.

THE VIDEO

The movie’s visual style is done no favors by this release’s 1.85:1/1080p transfer--encoded with VC-1 onto a 25GB disc--which renders things even more flat and lifeless. The image is soft and lacking in depth, and detail is middling at best and virtually nonexistent at worst. I’d wager the differences between this transfer and that of the standard-def DVD are negligible.

THE AUDIO

I wasn’t expecting much from the Dolby TrueHD 5.1 track, and that’s what was delivered. The sound design is front-heavy; with the exception of some very mild ambience, nothing is thrown to the rears. Dialogue sounds okay, as does the music (although Tim Atack’s score may take the crown as last year’s worst).

English, French, and Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1 tracks are also included; English SDH, French, and Spanish subtitles are available.

THE EXTRAS

All of the extras are presented in standard definition (letterboxed 4:3 widescreen), with the exception of the Making-of featurette which is anamorphic and runs at an average bitrate of 12Mpbs.

The Dawn of Lying (6 minutes) was intended as a prologue for the movie (it’s set during mankind’s prehistoric days and sets up the “what-if?” scenario of the movie) but was ultimately cut. Good thing, too, as it’s more than a little dumb. 

A Truly “Honest” Making-Of Featurette (7 minutes) is a jokey behind-the-scenes piece.

Five deleted scenes (7 minutes total) are also included. A couple of them are sort of funny, while the rest of them aren’t.

More Laughter: Corpsing and Outtakes (5 minutes) is a blooper reel.

Meet Karl Pilkington (18 minutes) focuses on the co-host of The Ricky Gervais Show, who appears in the abovementioned prologue. His reaction to the hurry-up-and-wait filmmaking process is funnier than anything you’ll find in the movie.

You also get four podcasts (10 minutes total), which were shot by Gervais and Robinson during production (likely for the movie’s official website). They’re mildly amusing, but a little of them goes a long way. 

A second disc contains a Digital Copy of the movie.

FINAL THOUGHTS

For his next theatrical endeavor, Ricky Gervais is reportedly once again working with longtime collaborator Stephen Merchant. Let’s hope that project--which will hopefully be based around an idea that can actually support a feature-length story--turns out far better than this one.